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Hmm. How best to start this?
I have been happy with my own progress in affiliate marketing so far.

September was my first month where I exceeded $1000 in affiliate programs alone. Each month seems to be increasing sales which is good, but when I think of the future I wonder if there is an easier way to move forward than plodding along the way I am, hoping to add $200 a month to my income.

Like everyone else I want to double this income, and double it again. For those of you who are earning $1000s, I am interested in whether you carried on the way you always worked to go from $1000 to $2000 to $3000 and so on. Each month seeing a gradual and steady climb in income.

Or,

did you find a secret weapon which rocketed your sales. Obviously noone wants to share their best secrets and that is only fair, so I have tried to provide options which could account for most cases I can think of.

My income skyrocketed November last year when I figured some things out. Then it sort of stabilized after January with minimal increases momth to month then it skyrocketed again in May then lost some fuel.

And now I'm predicting a back to back month of downturn including this month(first time happening). Eventhough I have more pages up, traffic is down.

I guess some things we can control but other things it depends on God, Google god that is [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_wink.gif[/img]

Once I figured out exactly what affiliate programs would convert well for the niche I'm working in, I then started to look for underperforming sites I could acquire in the same niche.

I bought one site in January this year and by the end of April had entirely earned back the acquisition costs. I am working on a second deal that I hope will bring similar (though possibly slightly slower) success.

It's all about building revenue streams... After all, if you want to double your money, you can:-

A) Double the traffic coming to your site (assuming it converts at the same rate)
B) Double the conversion rate of your current traffic
C) Build a second site in the same niche with a similar level of traffic and conversion ratio

Of course, in a real-world scenario, A), B) and C) are not exclusive - you can (and should) be doing all of these at the same time. It's just that a lot of affiliates are so focused on A) and B) that they completely lose sight of C) - which is often a much easier proposition!

Mostly what wly said, except that my traffic is steady (totally different pages are getting traffic), however to lower commission items. Thus, unless something happens, I suspect that total income will be lower this month.

Adding to Edwin's post: D) Find more niches. Repeat A,B,C.

That's why I still have traffic - different niches, different pages, different targetted audiences.

BTW, I have really been enjoying this travel log site that my dad recommended. He actually found it by searching google for "gaijin" (Dad is 100% Japanese genetically, never set foot in Japan, speaks no Japanese, and has a US Midwest accent).

My income skyrocketed Nov 2002. Like Wly, it was "after I figured some things out"! Before that it was steady, but fairly slow, increases in Revenue. Then some elements came together like gas, oxygen and an active spark plug. Varoom! It took off like an Indy car!

It has kept on skyrocketing except in April or so when I had to move all my sites--during Google's spidering. Gg got some of the new info but not all of it so there was a lag over the summer while all the ranks got back up where they belonged, but even then it trounced on last year's results.

Last month was a stellar month which broke all previous records. Awesome! Then came Screwgle--Google's evil twin--this month but revenues are coming in anyway. Just not so high as before the Screwgle index.

I also keep forcing out new pages/sections/sites which adds fuel to the engine!

All of Edwin's points are good, too, and I'm not overlooking any of them.

For us, it's been a combination of all four. We'll plod along, doing pretty much like everyone else, but trying new things.... then one of them will work (compared to 25 that didnt') So we'll then incorprate that in to as many sites/pages as possible, and plod along again.. tweaking, trying things, trying not to lose position... then a break will come, etc.

Our only downturns have been when merchants muck it up. If the'd just leave well enough alone.... "I know engineers. They love to change things!" (Bones from ST1) Truer words were never spoken.

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR> Wow! You really must be a leader! You are over a month ahead of the rest of us. Let us know what Christmas is like when you get there, will you? ~AffJus <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Sorry, I meant that my income skyrocketed in Nov. 2001... [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_redface.gif[/img]

Although I am looking forward to this year's Christmas buying season which is probably why I accidentally put "2002" in my original post.